Church Archives Research Articles

“All is withered and burnt”

In the years 1923-1929 the Clanwilliam Ring of the Dutch Reformed Church was struck by a drought that left the area’s traditionally rural and agricultural population struggling with issues of food security, unemployment, and bankruptcy. Occurring in the early 20th century, the still nascent Union government was unwilling to dedicate the resources to direct food assistance schemes under flawed sociological reasoning and lacked the institutional capacity necessary to provide direct alleviation for the impacts of the drought. Consequently, the Dutch Reformed Church became the main overseer of food provision and charitable relief efforts among stricken communities through its Algemene Armesorg Kommissie. Local Dominees, deacons and elders of the church bodies in the arid Karoo acted as a grass roots organization in the monitoring and distribution of assistance (primarily through clothing and food donations) for local communities. This article focuses on the social and political realities that led to the Dutch Reformed Church playing a central role in combating the impact of the 1923–1929 drought in the ring of Clanwilliam. The study made use of archival primary sources mostly from the Dutch Reformed Church Archive in Stellenbosch, with additional sources from the Western Cape Archival Repository System and the National Archive of South Africa. Secondary research sources such as published journal articles and books, as well as unpublished dissertations were used to contextualize primary information and to add previous studies’ discussions on the topic. The study proves that the church, through its well-organized Algemene Armesorg Kommissie charity wing, acted as a much-needed intermediary often organizing and distributing donations of food, clothing and money from donors in other congregations to drought-stricken areas in a time when the government could not or would not provide such assistance.

Positive Influence: Negotiating a Church Historiographical Canon with the West

The present article discusses the way in which the historiographical canon on the history of the Orthodox and Greek Catholic Churches in Transylvania during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was reconceptualized during and in the aftermath of the academic visit of Western specialists in Romania. Keith Hitchins’s visit to Romania in the early 1970s to undertake research in the church archives for his work on the history of the Romanian intelligentsia in the Austro-Hungarian Empire made an impact on how the history of the Greek Catholic Church was portrayed in the religious journals of the Romanian Orthodox Church. The subtle shifts in the canon included distinguishing the Greek Catholics from the Orthodox in Transylvania and reintroducing the Greek Catholic interwar historiography into the interpretation.

An Anthology of Faith-Based Collections’ Writings: Tracking the Genealogy of Scholarship on This Genre of Archives

Faith-based collections, also known as religious archives, church archives or archives of faith traditions, have paradoxically not received attention in mainstream archives. However, they permeate every facet of human endeavour. This could be attributed to this genre of archives as they are relatively unknown; there is a lack of general interest, maybe because of the small volume of archives generated from their parent churches or ministries, which renders them insignificant. Consequently, a definitive and authoritative text on faith-based collections has remained a pipe dream in the records and archives discipline, a global challenge. This paper explores the breadth of the writings to inform the global archival community so that scholars and archivists can contribute in this regard, thereby bridging this literary gap in our archival historiography. Faith-based collections, as they relate primarily to manuscripts of evangelists, are an under-researched area in Archival Science. Using secondary sources like books and reports and empirical works in journals, dissertations, theses, conference proceedings and so on, this paper provides a historical insight and timeline that highlights the trajectory of the scholarship on faith-based collections. While this article highlighted the scholarship on faith-based archives, it also contributed to managing manuscripts by evangelists/pastors in African Independent Churches (AICS) and mainstream churches. It offered insight into the emerging literature on faith-based collections and how this is scattered over various sources.

Using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) for detecting a crypt beneath a paved church floor

After the discovery of an archive document regarding an underground crypt beneath the f loors of the Church of St. Margaret (Sv. Marjeta) in Dol pri Ljubljani, Slovenia, further research was carried out to confirm its presence. An area filled with construction waste was discovered during a recent small-scale renovation of the church floor. This finding suggested the potential underground chamber may have been partly filled in during one of the previous restorations. A non-invasive GPR study was carried out along eight profiles inside the church to prove the existence of an underground crypt. Results show the presence of an air-filled chamber, confirmed later by a hole drilled in the floor. Additional findings in the church archive and pictures taken by a camera, lowered through a drilled hole, revealed three previously unknown caskets in the crypt. According to the archives, two of them belong to Baron Wolf Daniel Erberg and his wife who died in 1783 and 1774, respectively.

Istorijski arhiv Kotor – pamćenje grada

Kotor was the first town in the present-day Montenegro to have autonomous archival institution. The State Archives in Kotor was established on 30th November 1949. This piece of information points out to the awareness of the importance of archival cultural heritage that was being created in Kotor and in the wider region of Boka Kotorska Bay through centuries, as well as on the need for its preservation and presentation to expert and general public. It is, however, important to mention that as early as in 1417 a provision in the Book of Statutes of the Town of Kotor, printed in Venice in 1616 the oldest provision of which dates back to 1301, lays down a duty for all important acts created in the work of public institutions to be stored in three storages: St. Tryphon Cathedral reliquary, municipal office and in the office of the notary public. The year 1764 saw Marin Vrakjen being officially appointed as archivist in Kotor. Today, Kotor Historical Archives houses archival material created in the work of local authorities, legal entities and natural persons in Kotor but also in the wider region of Boka Kotorska and other parts of the present-day Montenegrin littoral up to Spič, in the vicinity of Bar. Archival departments in Herceg Novi, Budva and Bar also house part of the archival material created in their respective areas, just as church archives and museums do. The oldest document kept in Kotor Historical Archives dates back to 1309. It is a fragment of a contract for the sale of a property written on a piece of parchment. The task of every archival institution, thus also of Kotor Historical Archives, is to explore archival records of historical-scientific importance related to the events from political, social, economic and cultural life of Boka Kotorska spanning from the ancient past to the modern era; to study the documents by applying scientific methods, prepare them for the scholars of various fields, to publish collections of archival documents by different topics and to open wide its door to all those interested in the history of our town and the surrounding area.

THE FORMATION OF A JAVANESE REFORMED CHRISTIAN SETTLEMENT IN YOGYAKARTA URBAN AREA 1939-1959

<p><em>This article examined the connection between primordial and advance features in the formation of Javanese Reformed Christians settlement in urban Yogyakarta. It focused on the causal factors behind the spatial grouping. Most of the Javanese Reformed Christians experienced social mobility which enabled them to have better professions. This research used historical methods by using church archives and various secondary sources. In a way, religion became the ultimate foundation of the formation of spatial grouping for JRC residence in urban Yogyakarta. In another way, the zending fields in urban Yogyakarta did not only facilitate means of social ladder, but also equipped them with careers. This article also found that the formation of urban Protestant settlement in urban Yogyakarta took the same pattern from that of rural areas of Java. Both settlements required relatively distinct territorial unit enclosed as if within foreign territory, so that the residents would easily be focused on Protestant teachings. However, the urban settlement of this Protestant denomination differed in terms of access to modern facilities, such as education, hospital, transportation which proves that the facilities were originally intended for Europeans who mostly were Christians. The Reformed Christian Javanese benefitted to this facilities because they embraced the same religion as that of the Europeans.</em></p>

CONTRIBUŢII DOCUMENTARE REFERITOARE LA CONSTRUIREA ŞI FUNCȚIONAREA CATEDRALEI ORTODOXE „SF. IERARH NICOLAE” ȘI „SF. MARE MUCENIC GHEORGHE”, DIN MUNICIPIUL SF. GHEORGHE, JUD. COVASNA, ÎN TIMPUL REGIMULUI COMUNIST (1945–1983)

Capitalizing on the documents from the secular and church archives, the present article presents an almost unique case, namely an Orthodox church built, but unfinished, in the city of Sfântu Gheorghe, Covasna county, a city with a majority ethnic Hungarian population. It resisted the pressures of the Horthyst and Communist regimes, and thus in 1983, 45 years after the foundation stone was laid, it was completed, with the approval of the local and central Communist leaders.

Reflections on Leonard J. Arrington

Reflections on Leonard J. Arrington

Archiwa polskie w Wikipedii – analiza zawartości haseł

The aim of this article is to examine the presence of Polish archives in Wikipedia and attempt to answer the question about the image of these institutions appearing in this space. Entries from state archives, separate archives, those with entrusted sources, university and church archives were analysed in terms of the number of characters in a given article, structure, complexity and content. Particular attention was paid to elements such as maps and illustrations. The authorship of individual entries was also examined. The presence of Polish archives in Wikipedia is insufficient. State archives are represented the most in this respect. All 33 facilities have their own entry on the portal. These articles are generally quite Archiwa polskie w Wikipedii - analiza zawartości haseł extensive. On the other hand, separate archives, apart from military archives, Border Guard Archive and Central Police Archive, are virtually absent from Wikipedia. The situation is even worse when it comes to archives with entrusted resources and university archives. Only three such archives are present in Wikipedia. As far as church archives are concerned, five entries for such institutions were recorded. Individual articles usually contain data on the history of individual institutions, their organisational structure, less often information on tasks and archival resources. The weakly emphasised mission of the archives is striking. Therefore, it should be concluded that these entries fulfil their function only to a certain extent as they generally do not provide information about the purpose of archives, their activities and resources.

<i>The Harvest is Great and the Laborers are Few</i> (Father John Nedzelnitsky’s Report on the New York Deanery of the Aleutian and Alaskan Diocese in 1898)

The published document is a report on the New York Deanery of the Aleutian and Alaskan Diocese in 1898 submitted by the Dean John Nedzelnitsky to Bishop Tikhon (Bellavin). It is deposited in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division as a part of Alaskan Russian Church Archives (Cont. D 452–453, New York, N.Y. Nedzelnitskii, John, 1896–1899). Father Nedzelnitsky (1866–1946) is not widely known thus the paper provides his short biography. The Dean John Nedzelinsky was a dedicated Russian Orthodox missionary whose observations are a valuable source for the study of history of Russian Church in America. The document provides a vivid picture of the Russian Church activities in continental United States during the period of its rapid development due to influx of many new converts from Austria-Hungarian empire. The report has a traditional structure and follows the instructions issued by Bishop Tikhon. It touches upon all major aspects of managing the Diocese and runs about its activities and troubles in a frank and realistic manner. It can be seen from the report that in the given period the issues a Diocese was facing could be solved through reorganizing its management and far-sighted recruitment and allocation policy, with the key role of an honest and laborious person to be in charge of its further implementation. Moreover, the document gives a picture of the period as seen by two distinguished Orthodox missionaries since the report also contains interesting recommendations on the church activities that were later adopted by Bishop Tikhon. Tikhon’s own commentary and notes accompanying the report are of special interest revealing his colorful and engaging personality (in the text of the publication they are given in square brackets). The publication is unabridged and is provided by the introduction and reference information, including an estimate of the report’s significance for further research in the field.

Una historia de la emancipación negra: Esclavitud y abolición en la Argentina

The abolition of Latin American slavery has long been recognized as a complex and contentious process stretching over several decades. Historians who study that process face the challenge of incorporating into their stories multiple actors: state officials, lawyers, journalists, activists, and, not least, enslaved people actively seeking freedom. That approach has generated a rich historiography, ranging from early work by Emília Viotti da Costa, Robert Conrad, Rebecca Scott, and others up through recent books by scholars such as Jeffrey Needell, Angela Alonso, and Yesenia Barragan. Based on deep and meticulous research and clearly and effectively written, Magdalena Candioti's Una historia de la emancipación negra is a worthy addition to that literature.Candioti begins her story with the profoundly destabilizing impacts of national independence on the institution of slavery. Revolutionary rhetoric that compared Spanish rule to enslavement and that promised to strike off the chains of colonial rule inevitably raised the question of whether that promise included the chains of slavery. Since many, and probably most, independence leaders were themselves slave owners, this question struck uncomfortably close to home. The contradiction between national freedom and continuing enslavement produced first the abolition of the African slave trade in 1812 and then the Free Womb Law (Ley de Libertad de Vientres) the following year. The law decreed that children of enslaved mothers would continue to serve their mothers' enslavers until reaching the age of majority (16 for females, 20 for males), at which point they would achieve full freedom.One ambiguity of the new law was whether children of enslaved mothers were born free (and were therefore ingenuos) or whether they were born enslaved and then immediately freed (and were therefore libertos). The Reglamento de Libertos, approved a month after the initial law, settled that question and laid out the regulations governing this new class of persons. In 1840, a court in Tucumán found that “los derechos y obligaciones que tiene el patrono [enslaver of the child's mother] respecto del liberto son los mismos que tiene un amo respecto de un esclavo; . . . ambos tienen el derecho de servirse y sacar del liberto y esclavo una justa utilidad” (p. 88; emphasis in original). Patronos were also free to sell their libertos (after the age of two) to other owners, and Candioti finds many instances of slave parents going to the police to request assistance in getting their children back, “con suerte dispar” (p. 86).Meanwhile, those Africans and Afro-Argentines who had been enslaved at the time of the Free Womb Law's passage remained enslaved. They continued to pursue freedom in the same ways that they had pursued it under colonial rule, through negotiating with their enslavers and accumulating the savings with which to buy their freedom. Candioti finds that the same system of coartación (enslaver and enslaved person agreeing in advance on a fixed purchase price) that existed in Cuba, Peru, and other countries operated in Argentina as well, and that, as in other countries, women were clearly favored over men in grants of manumission (pp. 111–12).Independence further undermined slavery by opening another route to freedom, through military service. Several thousand slaves were conscripted into rebel armies and then into provincial forces during the civil wars that followed independence. Slaves could also volunteer for service, and many did so. Conscription was no guarantee of freedom, however, since many draftees died or returned from service broken in health.With no new slaves being born or imported from Africa, by the 1840s slavery's days in Argentina were clearly numbered. Reviewing the debates in the constitutional assembly of 1852–53, Candioti finds that Article 15, which abolished slavery, was approved with zero discussion, no voices speaking either for or against the measure. The constitution made no provision for compensation to former enslavers, but several provinces did institute programs that compensated owners for their liberated property.Throughout her book, Candioti stresses the tensions and disconnects between legal principles and daily lived reality, and the constant process of negotiation among enslaved persons, libertos, enslavers, and state officials. She has dug deep into administrative, judicial, and church archives and into nineteenth-century newspapers, and has made excellent use of the outpouring of research in recent years on Black and subaltern history in Argentina. Finally, rather than confining herself to Buenos Aires, she surveys conditions and practices throughout Argentina while simultaneously calling for further research on those provinces. All these aspects make the book a signal achievement and the obligatory reference for how slavery came to an end in Argentina.

MUSICAL EDITIONS OF 1943 BY THE RIGA PRINTING HOUSE OF NIKOLAI VIEGLAIS (based on the materials of the Assumption church archive in the village Aksenovo, Palkinsky district, Pskov region)

MUSICAL EDITIONS OF 1943 BY THE RIGA PRINTING HOUSE OF NIKOLAI VIEGLAIS (based on the materials of the Assumption church archive in the village Aksenovo, Palkinsky district, Pskov region)

Священномученик Иоанн Кочуров: годы служения в Америке

The article explores the American period in life and service of Holy Martyr Ioann Kochurov (1895–1907). This formative period for Fa. Kochurov when he grew up as a priest, missionary and a church leader remains relatively unexplored due to a lack of sources originating from the man himself (except for a couple of his writings in “American Orthodox Messenger” and few letters written to relatives at home). The newly available documents from the Library of Congress Manuscript Division (Alaskan Russian Church Archive) fill this void. They consist mostly of Kochurov’s own regular reports to his superiors (bishops Nickolay and Tikhon, as well as a dean of New York deanary Nedzel’nitsky) and provide a vivid picture of his multiple activities: missionary, parish life, church building and diocese responsibilities. These documents shed a new light on Fa. Kochurov’s relationships with his superiors as well as his overall contribution to the development of Alaskan and Aleutian diocese which reached its peak under Bishop Tikhon’s guidance. The new documentary evidence also reveals Holy Martyr’s personal traits – his deep devotion to the Orthodox mission in America, his integrity and courage of Christian convictions which ultimately led to his martyrdom in 1917.

Baptism of Stillborn Babies? A South African Methodist Perspective

Many rituals in Africa are deeply rooted in the cultural beliefs, traditions and indigenous religions of the continent. The rituals are guided by people’s belief in their existence after death, and the role of the living dead or ancestors. These African rituals have been infused by Christian, Muslim and Western concepts. Death rituals and the mourning practices of Africans are varied because of the existence of so many religious and cultural practices on the African continent. Many African families will engage in one way or another in some cleansing rituals after the death of a loved one including a stillborn. In the Methodist Church of Southern Africa (MCSA), no records of stillbirth baptism are kept in the Church archives, nor is there any pastoral guidance or liturgy available to assist grieving families regarding stillbirth. It is questionable whether stillbirth baptism should be allowed, in light of the fact that there is no record whatsoever from either the Old Testament or the New Testament which allows for this rite of passage. It is also clear that stillbirth baptism does not have a theological base.

Jazyk písomností Slovákov na dolnej zemi: na príklade slovenského vojvodinského evanjelického cirkevného zboru a. v. Kysáč v rokoch 1773 – 1918

Mass migrations of Slovaks from the north of Hungary to the south (to the Lowland) in the 18th and 19th centuries are part of the migration of serfs as part of the systematic colonization of Empress Maria Theresa after the expulsion of the Turks from this territory. Coexistence with other nations or old settlers, as well as state politics, naturally influenced further development and determined the life of immigrants in national, cultural, economic, social, as well as linguistic terms. The aim of this paper is to present the linguistic situation of the Slovaks in the settlement of Kysáč in today's Serbia based on church documents from their immigration to the end of the First World War. We examined the chronicle of the Kysáč priest František Jesenský from 1773, registers from the years 1787 – 1918, the minutes of the canonical visitation of the Kysáč church choir from 1835, the minutes of the school board of the Kysáč school from the years 1895 – 1915, the minutes of the presbytery conventions 1912 – 1916 and other documents of the church archive of the Slovak Evangelical Church a. c. in Kysáč.

An Investigation of Church Based Peace Building Models in Selected Churches in Kericho County

Peacebuilding with all members of the community in view of stemming potential and existing tension has become a necessity. In majority of politically and ethnically instigated violence, such as in the Kenyan post-election violence of 2008 and 2017, the Church was a major player in peace building processes as well as in the reconciliation process. This paper endeavoured to explore the available peace building models adopted by the Church in Kenya since 2008. To attain the mentioned objectives, the study engaged the Fowler theory of faith development. This was a qualitative research that applied the use of interviews and Focus Group discussions in the collection of primary data while secondary data used in this research was acquired through the review of documents and other relevant literature in public libraries and Church archives. Purposive sampling techniques were used to identify respondents, and the data analysed using context analysis. The study established Peace building models used by the Church were Mounting of Humanitarian Response Model and Policy advocacy which were done through Dialogue, Seminars, Evangelism, Sports and cultural events. These approaches to some extent helped to mitigate tension and violence in the region. Youth mentorship programs by the Church contributed to instilling the values of unity, honesty, peaceful co-existence as well as self-reliance among youth in the region and the society at large. The study recommends that religious organizations such as the National Council of Churches in Kenya (NCCK) and leaders should pursue peace building by ensuring that justice to all is achieved through methods that have respect for the people and also allow for the restoration of relations that foster and seek to correct injustices in regard to the fundamental values of human rights. The Kenyan Church should join many other faith-based peace advocates who endeavour to put into practise the principles of their belief in a manner that enables the building of local, regional, nationwide, as well as global machineries favourable for peace.

Vardis Fisher Pioneered Literary Mormon Writing

Vardis Fisher Pioneered Literary Mormon Writing

The Sesquicentennial, So What? An Assessment a Quarter Century Afterward

The Sesquicentennial, So What? An Assessment a Quarter Century Afterward

Ink under the Fingernails: Printing Politics in Nineteenth-Century Mexico by Corinna Zeltsman

Reviewed by: Ink under the Fingernails: Printing Politics in Nineteenth-Century Mexico by Corinna Zeltsman Shelley Garrigan Keywords Printer, Political Actor, Patronage, Bourbon Reforms, Privileges, Technology, Press Freedom, Censorship, Labor, Authorship, Print Shop, Ignacio Cumplido, Inquisition, Lafragua Law, Property, Nationalization, Liberal Triumph, Porfirio Díaz, Compositor, Criminalization zeltsman, corinna. Ink under the Fingernails: Printing Politics in Nineteenth-Century Mexico. U of California P, 2021. 350 pp. Corinna Zeltsman has made a powerful contribution to Mexican studies with this detailed and profound investigation, which traces the politics of printing through the multilayered sociocultural and governmental shifts that mark the long nineteenth century in Mexico, at one point the printing hub of the Americas. Zeltsman’s investigation takes readers on a tour through the intricate debates, on-the-ground labor practices, disagreements, and laws through which printing practices evolved, traversing printing workshop floors, government offices of shifting administrations, churches, collections of official and ephemeral printed matter, jail cells, and the streets of Mexico. The effect is a persuasive invitation to consider the centrality of print culture with respect to the larger dynamics that unfold around it as the century progresses. The sheer amount and variety of archival work in this piece of scholarship is extraordinary; Zeltsman draws from a range that includes several state and municipal, notarial, and church archives, libraries, records from the 19th-century Mexican national government printing office, and a special collection of 19th-century artifacts housed at the Sutro Library of California to reconstruct a complex series of portraits of the various and evolving political dynamics in which 19th-century Mexican print culture was [End Page 637] embedded. In the introduction, the author invokes the ideas of Ángel Rama, Benedict Anderson, and Jürgen Habermas to contrast their affirmations regarding print and the public sphere in different sociopolitical contexts with Mexico, and successfully argues the case for constructing a different, more nuanced type of framework from which to assess the complexity of print dynamics in the 19th-century Mexican context. The first two chapters cover the late colonial period. Chapter one illustrates how Mexico, in the development of a nascent print culture, differed from the classic narratives of the north Atlantic in which print capitalism evolved as an independently financed venture that stood in rebellious opposition to the status quo. In Mexico, printers relied upon the vertical privileges granted by the viceregal system that operated during the era of the Bourbon reforms in order to receive permission to establish their businesses, and political actors strongly influenced the news that reached the public. In one of several gripping case studies that emerge in this investigation, Zeltsman focuses on the Gazeta de México run by Manuel Antonio Valdés, and the eventual loss of his printing privileges due to a conflict with the viceroy regarding the role of print in demonstrating individual nationalist allegiances to the Spanish Crown during the monarchical crisis of 1808. Chapter two focuses on the uneven evolution of press laws at the tail end of the colonial era, which awakened an intricate set of conflicts that would require several decades to resolve. First appearing in the Cortes of Cádiz in 1810 Spain, the laws abolishing privileges and licenses were enacted during a two-month window in Mexico in 1812, and then again during the Liberal Triennium of Spain in 1820. The vague parameters around freedom of the press required the creation of a new regulatory framework beyond the Inquisition, leading to the birth of a censorship office and a press prosecutor. The result was an abundant air of uncertainty regarding what could be printed and why. A lively published debate between two writers and the printer-heir Alejandro Valdés sheds light on how the boundaries between authors and printers were still very much in flux, and an illegal and scandalous broadside in Puebla reveals the tenuous abilities of liberal forms of print censorship to maintain social order. Chapter three, set in the 1840s, marks a shift in the historic alliance between printers and the state as officials struggled to maintain social order in an era of extreme uprisings and instability. Who, ultimately, was responsible for a given published work...

The Globalization of the Church History Department: The Plight of an Outsider Looking In (A Personal Reflection)

The Globalization of the Church History Department: The Plight of an Outsider Looking In (A Personal Reflection)